As promised, Microsoft has released the beta to Windows 7 to the general public a few hours ago. Don't get your hopes up yet, though, as Microsoft's servers are completely hammered right now - which isn't too hard to imagine, seeing the 2.5 million download limit Microsoft imposed. This probably led to everyone rushing to Microsoft's servers to get their hands on the beta, clogging the servers (2.5m times a 3GB image file, do the math). You will have to be patient, and hope for the best if you want the beta and its product key. The beta will expire August 1st, 2009.